


Through the eyes of grief

by charimiel



Series: Tumblr Prompts [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Nogitsune, Pre-Slash, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-20
Updated: 2014-07-20
Packaged: 2018-02-09 16:53:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1990446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charimiel/pseuds/charimiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek catches the scent of fear through his open car window on his way back from the gas station, acrid and familiar and all Stiles. He follows the trail through town, and finds Stiles on one of the roads out of town, feet bare and shoulders hunched. He pulls up next to him, and Stiles turns to face the car, eyes unfocused. He stops walking.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through the eyes of grief

Derek catches the scent of fear through his open car window on his way back from the gas station, acrid and familiar and all Stiles. He follows the trail through town, and finds Stiles on one of the roads out of town, feet bare and shoulders hunched. He pulls up next to him, and Stiles turns to face the car, eyes unfocused. He stops walking.

The scene is familiar by now, the number of times Derek has found Stiles like this, aimless and lost, more than he can count on a single pair of hands.

He gets out of the car, walks around to Stiles, and gently guides him around to the passenger seat, hands firm on his shoulders. Stiles flinches, but doesn’t say a word. That’s horribly familiar too now, Stiles’s silence. He never thought he’d miss the chatter, spent half the time he was ever with Stiles wishing the kid would just shut up, but that’s just how life works for them isn’t it. What’s that saying about wishing? Be careful what you wish for? That seems appropriate for their situation.

Stiles doesn’t move once Derek gets him into the car, so Derek leans over to put Stiles’s seatbelt on for him. The drive to Scott’s is quiet and unnerving, and it’s horrific that this is becoming some sort of normal.

 

\---

 

“We need to do something.” Scott says, when Derek’s delivered Stiles to him and he’s been taken upstairs, and now is almost definitely not asleep in Scott’s bed.

“Do what?” Derek asks, staring into the mug of coffee Scott’s placed in front of him. It’s black, because Scott doesn’t know any better, doesn’t know that he takes it with so much milk and sugar even Stiles calls it an abomination. The only person who knows how he takes his coffee is currently upstairs, losing his grip on reality.

“Deaton says he needs an anchor.” Scott says quietly, and Derek scoffs.

“Isn’t that Deaton’s fall back on advice? Get an anchor, you need an anchor. What good have anchors ever done anyway?” Derek says, not even bothering to keep the bitterness out of his voice.

“It helped me.” Scott says, voice still soft. That’s something else new, Scott’s patience. Derek barely sees a hint of the stupid kid he first met these days, only two years ago. Grief does that to a person, and he’s glad it changed Scott like this, didn’t twist him like it did Derek in the months and years after the fire.

Derek stands and heads to the fridge to get the milk, grabs the sugar out of the cupboard, makes his coffee how he likes it to avoid having to see Scott’s concerned eyes looking at him for just a little longer.

“Derek.” Scott says, and it’s still kind, but there’s enough alpha in the voice he looks up automatically, meeting Scott’s perceptive stare.

“You’re right.” Derek admits, exhaling through his nose in a sigh.

“I can’t do it.” Scott says, and it should come as more of a surprise, but Derek thinks he can see why. Scott and Stiles will always be friends, yes, but there are enough cracks in the bridge connecting them that in crossing the whole thing would collapse under their weight. Scott can’t use the bridge to pull Stiles out; because they’ve changed enough it wouldn’t be as strong an anchor as they need.

“You could.” Scott says, and that does come as a surprise. He opens his mouth, but Scott doesn’t let him speak, continues with, “Hear me out Derek. You know each other, and you know what he’s going through, I know you do.”

It’s true, no matter how much Derek wishes it wasn’t. Stiles reminds him of himself after Kate so much that it burns to even look at Stiles sometimes. And they do know each other, got to know each other recently enough that Derek knows the changed creature resting upstairs in a way that Scott doesn’t. He may not have known the old Stiles, but he knows this one, knows him like he knows the moon, strong and distant and with a fierce pull on his very bones.

“I could.” He agrees, and Scott looks so grateful and so young Derek’s heart aches. His mother always told him he had a kind heart. He hasn’t believed her in a very long time.

 

\---

 

“Stiles?” he asks, stepping into Scott’s room. It’s dark, but he can see Stiles sitting on the edge of the bed, motionless and shadowed.

Stiles doesn’t respond, but Derek wasn’t expecting him to. Derek pulls him up, leads him gently downstairs and out of the house, into the car again, and drives him home. When he parks in the drive and gets out of the car, instead of just waiting for Stiles to get out, there’s a flash of something in Stiles’s eyes, muted confusion.

Derek gets him inside, leads them both up to Stiles’s room, and sits down on the edge of the bed after seating Stiles there too. They end up pressed together from shoulder to ankle, and Derek stares at Stiles’s profile, Stiles’s eyes on the blank wall across from them.

He waits, because he recognises the silence, knows Stiles will talk when he’s ready.

The silence stretches for what feels like hours, like days. It can’t be that long, because the sun remains resolutely below the horizon, the half-moon proud in the sky, but silence can stretch time in a way Derek knows like a second skin.

“I thought I was dreaming.” Stiles whispers, like a prayer into the night. Derek waits. “I was sure it was still in me but I thought it was just a dream and then it wasn’t.”

Stiles’s hands are shaking, so Derek takes them in his own and holds them still.

“Look at me.” He whispers, keeping to the quiet and the intimacy it brings.

Stiles doesn’t move for a long moment, but eventually he turns to face Derek, his eyes wet and scared.

Derek pulls one of Stiles’s hands up to his chest, presses it against his heart in a way he remembers Laura doing, when he was too deep in the pain to hear her heartbeat.

“This is real” Derek says, eyes locked on Stiles’s, and Stiles’s eyes flicker with a hint of humour.

“Does that make you Katniss?” he asks, clearly some joke, and Derek grins at the return of the humour, even if it is weak and shaky and falls just a little flat.

“Scott told me to be your anchor. Said I could be.” He whispers, scanning Stiles’s face.

Stiles blinks, and Derek sees his lips flick up in a weak smile.

“Scott’s right.” Stiles admits, his voice quiet but firm. It’s the most like himself he’s been in weeks, and Derek gives in to the urge to just pull him in, hold him close, breathe in his scent.

Stiles clings back, face pressed in Derek’s neck, and Derek can feel the wetness there, knows not to call Stiles out on it.

“Thank you.” Stiles whispers, lips moving against Derek’s neck, and Derek runs a hand down his back, grounding and firm.

“Anytime.”

**Author's Note:**

> Based on;  
> Sterek Prompt: it's post-nogitsune, and Stiles is losing his grip on reality through nightmares, panic attacks and general PTSD, as he still believes he is possessed. Deaton and the Sheriff talk to the pack about finding an anchor for Stiles so he can separate dreams from reality. Derek volunteers because of his PTSD after the fire. And this is a sort of intervention thing, because Stiles thinks everyone will be happier if he's not around anymore. Yeah?
> 
> I took some liberties, but it's kinda close?
> 
>  
> 
> [Come say hi, or prompt me here!](http://charimiel.tumblr.com)


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